Why does Organizational Performance Fluctuate in Agricultural Industrialization Consortia: A Study Based on Dual Paradox in Development and Institution

Agricultural industrialization consortium is a key policy tool to promote agricultural development for local governments in China. However, a stylized fact is that various consortia showed promising organizational performance at start, but then the performance deteriorated at later stages. The driving force behind is the dual paradox inherent in development and institution. The consortium is overly development oriented; yet as an institution it cannot adapt to the strong development impulses. Case studies show that the dual paradox inevitably led to the decline in organizational performance.

Effects of Sales Tax Competition on Local Revenue Capacity: Empirical Analysis of California County Governments

This study empirically examines the effects of tax competition in both horizontal and vertical ways on the revenue capacity of counties in California from 2003 to 2015. Spatial Durbin model (SDM) identifies the effects of two-way tax competition on a county’s revenue capacity. The findings provide evidence that local sales tax helps a county expand its total revenue, but the two-way tax competition brings about a decrease in local revenue capacity as a result of spillovers. Furthermore, a lower-taxing area can have more benefits because the expansions in the neighbors are much greater than the higher-taxing one. In spite of the extant research of tax competition, this study adds another contribution to this research arena that the empirical approach of the SDM rules out the geospatial effects of the other explanatory variables that might have some unobserved effects in the extant literature.

The Legal Aspects of Activities Taken by Local Authorities to Promote Sustainable Development Goals: Between Global and Regional Regulations in Poland

This article examines the role of local authorities in promoting the sustainable development goals set out in the United Nations 2030 Agenda. The main aim was to analyse the legal aspects of activities taken by local authorities obliged to promote SDGs with the use of global and regional regulations, using the example of Poland. The adoption of the 2030 Agenda has damaged the current, ineffective model of Implementation of Sustainable Development. The present study discusses the Polish approach to sustainable development, including the experience and tasks of Polish municipalities, poviats, and voivodships in the field of sustainable development strategies as well as the prospects of implementing the goals of the new 2030 Agenda. The critical analysis of the legal aspects of activities taken by local authorities confirmed the thesis that the global solutions proposed in the 2030 Agenda are at least partially compatible with local legal regulations.

''Compulsory'' Migration Governance at Local Level: The Case of İstanbul

This article focuses on the increasing role of cities and local governments in migration governance through following the increasing “local turn” approach in migration studies in recent years. Turkey, which has a long immigration history and by far the largest immigration population of the country with massive Syrian immigration which started in particular in 2011, cities and local governments have developed different local governance arrangements by which they are trying to produce answers to the diversity brought about by immigration. Local responses differ in terms of scope, actor, approach and method. In this study, how and why the municipalities produce different responses are discussed in the context of the role of the municipalities and the common methods that local responses share despite the same legal framework and being a part of Istanbul metropolitan area. Thus, based on the analysis of the field study conducted in six districts of Istanbul, it has been revealed that the answers given to migration and immigrants are shaped in the context of a high informality and compulsory governance.

Essence of Self-governance Illustrated with an Example of the Professional Self-government Body of Legal Counsels (in Poland)

The subject of the article covers the issues concerning the concept of self-government and the constitutionally differentiated types thereof, which realise the principle of decentralisation of public power. The systemic principles of the functioning of the democratic state are defined by the operation of self-governments, including the professional self-government bodies which associate the people who perform the public trust professions. Therefore, it plays a key role both in forming the political system of the state and, consequently, in performing public tasks. The aim of the article is to show the basic features of self-governance which form this concept. It in turn allows to define the essence of self-governance, however, not only abstractly but on a given example – the professional self-government of legal counsels in Poland. The basic thesis of the article is the statement that the self-governance is the best form of exercising power in the democratic systems, which enables the proper performance of the public tasks of major importance. It concerns both the territorial self-governments and professional self-governments, but also, first and foremost, the ones that associate the people who perform the professions of public trust, and the legal counsel is one of such professions.

Functional Regions as Bases for Provinces in Slovenia

Socio-economically based functional regions, which are partially self-contained economic areas, are often more suitable for various structural analyses, implementation of state and regional policies, development of state administration, planning and monitoring of spatial development, identification of spatial disparities and other analyses of socio-economic relations than the traditional historically and geographically based administrative regions. This article therefore examines the assumption that functional regions are a suitable basis for the formation of territorial provinces in Slovenia. We have modelled the functional regions of Slovenia according to the established and internationally accepted method CURDS and compared them with the current proposals for provinces and established statistical regions in Slovenia. The results show a very strong functional contiguity and a good economic balance of eight provinces and a very good population balance of the provinces with two special status urban municipalities.

Reflections on the Closure of Rural Schools in the Local Socio-economic Context - The Example of Poland

The aim of the research has been to portray spatial differentiation of the process of school closures in rural areas of Poland, as well as to identify causes, and the effects of the closures on the socio-economic functioning of communities and local governments. To achieve that, desk research was first applied, with data used to classify Poland’s gminas (local-authority areas), in line with changes in numbers of pupils and schools. In the next step, in-depth interviews with gmina authorities and inhabitants were conducted, to allow intentionally-selected case studies to be considered further. It emerged that the main reasons for around 3300 Polish schools to close over the 2000-2016 period were declining fertility plus migration, combining to reduce numbers of primary-school pupils. Economic reasons were cited as the direct cause of school closures in the countryside. Both the negative and positive effects of closing rural schools in various groups were found.

The Impact of Maximum Allowable Debt Level of Local Government Units on their Investment Potential

Keeping local government units’ financial stability to run necessary projects is becoming a severe threat due to the remarkable increase of theirs’ debt level. A question arises whether the application of debt limits excessively restrict municipalities’ investment potential. Using the linear regression model, we proved that increasing the maximum allowable debt level decreases investment potential. We have challenged the relevance of using fiscal rules and presented liberalizing the fiscal rules’ principles to assess the investment potential as an indicator to guarantee optimum use of the local government units’ economic potential from different perspectives.

Non-competitive Elections at the Local Level and the Incumbency Advantage of Mayors – Research Experiences from Poland

The objective of this paper is an attempt to answer if non-competitive elections to commune councils in Poland may be the result of incumbency advantage of mayors. The author assumes, that the effects of incumbency advantage of mayors in influence not only the competition for the office of mayor, but also the entire local political scene. These effects may weaken the competitiveness of elections and lead to the cartelisation of local political scenes. In extreme cases, it may even cause the degeneration of political pluralism and lead to non-competitive elections at both the executive and legislative levels. The paper analyses relationships between the competitiveness of elections at the local level and the incumbency advantage effect as exemplified by a group of small communes with up to 20,000 inhabitants and presents the findings of the conducted research in the form of case studies of 18 localities representing six regions of Poland.

Evaluating Inclusive Transparency in Spanish Local Government

This article defines and analyzes a new concept: inclusive transparency. Specifically, it conducts a comparative study of transparency portals in twenty-five Spanish local councils, all of which occupy prime positions in Transparency International’s Index of Municipalities. The evaluation aims to establish their degree of compliance with Spanish and European regulations, ensuring website accessibility for people with disabilities. To this end, an evaluation model (composed of 4 criteria, 11 variables and 45 indicators) has been generated, taking inspiration from electronic accessibility guidelines, which have been applied using automatic techniques and transparency portal revision manuals. The results of the research allow verification of a positive correlation between the levels of active and inclusive transparency. In other words, whether in terms of active advertising benchmark municipalities design and manage their portals in ways which also guarantee, alongside all other citizens, the right of access for people with limited capacities (hearing, visual, mobile and cognitive) thereby enahancing the exercise of their political citizenship and their social integration.